What is a WordPress Child Theme?

What is a WordPress Child theme?

A WordPress child theme as theme that inherits the functionality (how it works) and styling (look and feel) of a parent theme.

What is a WordPress Parent Theme

This is simply the theme you choose to use on your WordPress website.

Do I need to have a WordPress child theme?

The short answer is YES! In caps and with an exclamation mark.

Child themes are highly recommended when modifying existing themes to maintain their original design and code.

This is normally a consideration for Website Developers, however WordPress is very intuitive and enables anyone to make and manage their own website.

That said, if you make modifications to your website without using a child theme, updates to your theme can overwrite those changes.

Why does this happen?

Well, when a theme author makes changes to their theme, these changes come to you as a “theme update.” During the update process, the system overwrites the ‘old theme files’ with the ‘new theme files’. This means that if you made any changes to the old theme files, the update will replace the entire file you changed with the new files. The update will delete your changes contained in the old files along with the old pages.

How does a Child Theme prevent my changes from being deleted?

When you create a child theme, you are basically making a new set of files that contains only the changes and modifications that you have made. These files will never be changed or deleted or replaced because the Theme Developer cannot update them. They can only update the Parent Theme Files.

This allows you to create a safe space between the latest theme files and your customisations.

What files can I make ‘Child Theme Files’?

Normally, custom functions and direct theme file editing (for example the ‘header.php’ files are what you would include in your child theme, however you can include any of the original theme files in your child theme.

Do I need to make custom CSS changes in my Child Theme?

If you are using any of the latest WordPress themes, or if you are using any of the Top 10 best WordPress themes, chances are you do not need to add a custom CSS file to your child theme. This is because the developers have already created a space for you to make custom CSS changes. This is normally accessible via: Appearance -> Customise -> Custom CSS, however the path can vary slightly between theme authors.